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Naked Museum visitors look at pictures of the show "Nude Men from 1800 to Today" during a special opening to friends of nudism at the Leopold Museum, Vienna, Austria. The show "Nude Men from 1800 to Today" opened its doors from 19 October 2012 to March 4,2013, looking at how artists have dealt with the theme of male nudity over the centuries. — AP Photo

VIENNA: The exhibit in Vienna's Leopold Museum is entitled "Naked Men", so a group of nudists and naturalists took the curators at their word and showed up to see it on Monday in the buff.

"It is good to be free, I am seeing this exhibition for the second time now and it is perfect to see 'Naked Men' as a naked man," said one of the visitors who called himself Max and who on his previous visit wore his clothes.

The exhibition, which has been extended until March 4, is designed to show the diverse and changing depictions of male nudity in art history.

Among its exhibits is a grotesque self-portrait by Egon Schiele and a photograph by French artists Pierre & Gilles called "Vive La France" of three men of different races wearing nothing but blue, white and red socks and soccer boots.

Outrage from parents and religious groups in October forced the Leopold to cover up the private parts of the three nude male soccer players used on large publicity posters around Vienna.

But "Naked Men" helped boost visitor numbers at the museum by 17 per cent to more than 364,000 last year.

The museum - named for Austrian collector Rudolf Leopold - was inspired to invite the public to get naked to see the exhibition after an inquiry from a group of German nudists.

Around 250 viewers of various ages and nationalities attended the special showing.

"It is a great story to tell my friends," said Luc, a student from France who, like most people interviewed, declined to give his surname or to be photographed.

"This is my first time doing this naked, I thought it is time to make some nonsense."

However, not everyone thought it was all that special.

"I don't understand what the big fuss is about," said Moritz, from Germany. "Everyone has seen real naked men before."

Comments (9) Closed

Sidster

Feb 20, 2013 02:47am

laugh out loud

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Qaiser Bakhtiari

Feb 19, 2013 02:40pm

Readers must remember that this is in the western hemisphere. Their customs and traditions are different from ours. However the mistake would be to think that everyone in the West subscribe to nudism. Vast majority of people would not do this however they are tolerant of people who do provided they follow the designated areas. Perhaps Pakistanis can take a little lesson of tolerance from the west where all religions and casts coexist in peace unlike in Pakistan.

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Darius03

Feb 19, 2013 03:46pm

Naked men watching paintings of naked men not much controversy there. Let's see how it will be if the exhibit will not be paintings but photographs! That wouldn't be art, would it?

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Qaiser Bakhtiari

Feb 19, 2013 01:58pm

This is better then murdering innocent women and children. Great work right wing nutters you just murdered a 100 innocent people.

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Extrmst

Feb 19, 2013 10:21am

Great work liberals, this is ur freedom of speech is... nude like donkeys and monkeys! that's why u ppl receive 60 millions to promote nature... great slogans with mischievous intentions....!